


With Nothing Left

by Kit_Amongst_The_Pigeons



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angst, Canonical Character Death, Gen, Hurt No Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-28
Updated: 2019-08-28
Packaged: 2020-09-28 06:42:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,148
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20421623
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kit_Amongst_The_Pigeons/pseuds/Kit_Amongst_The_Pigeons
Summary: Tony goes home.





	With Nothing Left

**Author's Note:**

> Cross-Posted from my Tumblr: https://kit-amongst-the-pigeons.tumblr.com/post/174438054102/nebula-is-much-more-adept-at-flying-the-massive
> 
> I know that everyone and their mother has now written one of these stories, but here's mine anyway.
> 
> No Beta.

Nebula is much more adept at flying the massive donut than... than _ they _ had been on the way to Titan and for some reason, some reason that Tony can’t quite comprehend, she takes them straight back to Earth.

He wants to tell her that he can’t go back there, that he has to go anywhere, anywhere, but there. But the words break in his lungs and cut up his throat and he says nothing.

She’s taking him somewhere that he’s never been before, and he can’t bring himself to find the energy to care, let alone to ask her where she is going or why. The intensity of the relief that chills his brain when he realises that they aren’t going to New York, that they aren’t going to that two-bedroom flat where he would have to break another’s heart with the shard of his own still pulsing in his chest, overwhelms him.

The ring touches down outside a structure of some kind.

“I followed Thanos’ energy,” said Nebula, moving away from the controls, “he was here.”

On the ground beneath them, there are people, corpses, and there are those that move among them, each an angel of death that cannot, or dare not, comprehend the task ahead of them. But Tony can see his reflection in the people who stand, alone, relics of ancient disasters, among the crowds, those who have no one to bury, no faces to seek out in the crowds of onlookers. 

Nebula opens a hatch on the side of the donut and steps out.

It is strange, he thinks as he follows her numbly onto the grassy land, to be used to having weapons pointed at you as you attempt to deal with your own emotions.

The spears which meet his throat were not unexpected, nor unwelcome, and he could almost hear someone’s surprised exhale. He wondered whose it was, whether it was his younger self, or whether it was someone even younger than Tony had been when he had first been on the end of a live weapon. A fresh tug of agony yanked his stomach down, and he followed it, knees hitting the ground and head falling forwards slightly.

“No. He’s a friend.”

That voice saying those words.

Was there no end to this day which brought him nothing solid upon which he could rebuild? A hand reached into his field of vision and took hold of his. Tony made no effort to grip the hand, nor to use his own strength to stand up when he was pulled in that direction. Still, when his feet were under him, he found he could stand again.

“Tony,” said Steve, looking him over, taking in all the injuries, “we thought you were dead.”

“I wish.”

“We lost,” said Steve, as if Tony didn’t know that, as if each fibre of his being wasn't threatening to unweave, “we lost so much.”

“I know.”

Steve finally saw Nebula, standing beside Tony.

“Who’s she?”

“A good guy.”

Tony couldn’t find sentences. His hands flexed at his side as if he were grasping manually for the words, and he could still feel it. He could still feel the dust, the ash, ground into the sweat of his palms and mixed with the tears that he had shed on their journey. 

He blinked and realised that Steve had been talking.

“What?”

“I said, we lost Sam, Wanda, T’Challa and Bucky – and Vision. I don’t know about the others, Barton and Lang, or about Pepper. Why don’t we go inside though?”

“Sure, whatever.”

Tony followed Steve, through the doors of the building and into a room. Scattered around were various people that he knew and some that he didn’t. Thor seemed to be conversing with a tree and a raccoon for reasons that Tony didn’t care to find out, and in another corner Natasha was on the phone, one hand playing with her knife. And there, sitting slumped in a chair, was his best friend.

“Rhodey?” he said, voice almost inaudible.

“Tony.” 

Rhodey was on his feet in an instant, coming over to wrap his arms around Tony’s shoulders. Tony let him, his head falling into the crook of his neck, but he didn’t feel any relief. It was odd. He should have felt a cool sensation after the panic that maybe he was gone – and there had been brief moments of panic in which he had imagined being completely alone – but there was nothing. There was just the sound of his heartbeat so loud in his ears that he thought they would burst.

And then they were interrupted. From a door at the back of the room came the sound of footsteps and Tony looked up to find a young woman, her outfit torn and her face flushed, but her bearing regal and her eyes hard.

“Well, that did not go as well as I had hoped,” she said, looking around at them all, “I was attacked in my lab before I could disconnect all of the synapses.”

“You have a lab?” said Tony, before he could stop himself.

“Yes, I am in charge of all technological advances in Wakanda. I help others protect us, protect our country.”

In that moment, when her hard eyes softened and glittered with pride, she looked so much like Peter did when he had finished a project, when he had seen something through that Tony broke all over again. 

He fell into a nearby chair, dropped his head into his hands and started to rock ever so slightly. He’d never see Peter, torch in his mouth and tools in each hand again. Never hear him make some reference to some internet thing that Tony didn’t understand, but which almost always left Ned huffing with laughter. Tears rolled down his arms and he made no move to stop them.

It was a feeling unlike any other, except perhaps for the way that he had felt when his parents had died. A profound sense of the loss of the years that he had expected, that he had been owed – that Peter had deserved. 

His mind was a list of so many events he’d miss out on: Peter graduating, Peter saying his vows, Peter holding his child, him holding his grandchild.

Grandchild? Where had that come from?

Tony knew that it had come from the warmest corner of his heart, the place where he loved so deeply but didn’t dare tread. He had told Pepper that he wanted a child, someone that he could guide and love and someone who would be the most important person in the world to him. Even then, he had known that that space in his heart already had one resident.

Now, he knew for certain as his tears marked tracks in the ash that had been his son, that part of his heart had been chipped away for good.


End file.
